The present invention pertains to the field of telephonic voice mail messaging. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method of and apparatus for retrieving information from the Internet and for textual information, converting the information into a digital voice file for wide scale distribution over a telephonic voice mail messaging network.
Telephonic voice mail messaging systems are well known in the art and allow a user of the telephonic voice mail messaging system to record and retrieve messages over an analog telephonic voice line. In a typical telephonic voice mail messaging system, the user is assigned a voice mail box and an individual passcode which is typically entered using the key pad of a telephone. When using an assigned telephone which is directly connected to the telephonic voice mail messaging system, the user can generally access the telephonic voice mail messaging system by simply entering his or her mail box number or passcode. Alternatively, a user may access the telephonic voice mail messaging system from an external or xe2x80x9coutsidexe2x80x9d telephone by dialing into the system from the external telephone and then entering his or her mailbox number and passcode. Once connected to the telephonic voice mail messaging system, a user may access his or her voice mail box in order to listen to, record and delete messages. More sophisticated voice mail messaging systems allow a user to send copies of messages from his or her voice mail box to the voice mail box of another user of the system. For example, this may occur if the user has gotten a telephonic voice mail message regarding a meeting date or time and wishes to forward the information on to a third party who will also be attending the meeting.
Additionally, some systems allow a user to send a voice mail message out to a group of persons by designing a customized list and directing the voice mail messaging system to send the voice mail message out to all persons on the list. For example, if the user is a member of a product sales group and he or she receives a message regarding a target production release date for a new product line, he or she may wish to forward the message to all members of the sales group. It is understood that telephonic voice mail messaging systems are designed with specific protocols. However, multiple telephonic voice mail messaging systems may be interconnected through an established voice mail network over standard public switched telephone network (PSTN) phone lines. The voice mail networks could also be coupled together over a digital network. The voice mail networks typically communicate with proprietary protocols. The use of an interchange allows multiple telephonic voice mail messaging systems which use different protocols to communicate with each other.
Currently, however, a user must perform all messaging functions manually from a telephone set by entering a predetermined series of keystrokes on the telephone key pad. If a user receives voice mail messages daily and wishes to provide these messages to a number of persons on a daily basis, the user is required to manually perform such an operation each time, e.g., on a daily basis. In a voice mail network having multiple telephonic voice mail messaging systems, this process can be time consuming and may require a user to expend precious time forwarding messages rather than working productively.
The interconnection of individual PCs and workstations configured in an office network to the Internet has become increasingly popular. Everyday, thousands of people rely upon the Internet to find information about various people, places and things. For example, the Internet allows users to gain a wide array of information ranging from stock price quotes to product line information, all from their PC within a matter of minutes.
An Internet search engine is an Internet service which automates a search over the Internet. For example, a user wishing to access information about a technique for blowing glass may utilize a search engine. The search engine will automatically retrieve a list of Internet web sites pertaining to the specialized topic (i.e. glass blowing). The user can then check out each web site individually, often through the use of a hyperlink which allows the user to jump directly to the relevant web site.
Some Internet search engines will create customized user pages. Yahoo(trademark) is one such search engine. Using a service known as xe2x80x9cMy Yahooxe2x80x9d, a user who frequently accesses certain information, such as sports pages for scores of recent sporting events and/or stock quote pricing pages, may be able to create a customized web page which contains all of the relevant information he or she wishes to access. This service eliminates the need for the user to jump from web site to web site and allows all of the regularly accessed information to be viewed at the simple click of a mouse button.
However, since the advent of the Internet, millions of users have had to take time out of their busy day to gain access to a computer terminal in order to access such information from the Internet. While many Internet search engines, such as Yahoo(trademark), will allow users to set up customized web pages, users with extremely busy schedules which may require them to travel extensively or spend a great deal of time on the road may not be able to get access to a computer until they return to the office at the end of the day. Accordingly, they cannot take time out of their busy day to log onto the Internet to check stock prices or find information about various products and/or services offered from vendors around the world until late in the day. As a result of which, a user may often miss important messages or vital information.
One solution to this problem has been the use of laptop or lightweight personal computers which are specifically designed for use by persons who may travel extensively but still require access to a computer terminal. Typically, these laptop or lightweight personal computers are equipped with a modem and communications card which allow users to dial in through any local phone line in order to gain access to the Internet. However, these laptop or lightweight personal computers may often be quite expensive and/or are often cumbersome to carry around at all times. Additionally, a user must still take time out of his busy schedule to set up his computer terminal, dial into his or her Internet connection service provider, and log onto the Internet. As a result, many users are reluctant to carry around a laptop and are not afforded the convenience of being able to log onto the Internet at any time.
Another solution has been the use of automated paging alert systems for notification of important e-mail messages. In such systems, a user e-mail account is coordinated for use with an individual paging system such that the user will receive a page whenever an important e-mail message is received, thereby notifying the user of the e-mail message at the time it is received. However, this solution is not ideal due to several inherent problems. The first and most obvious being the fact that such a solution is limited to e-mail applications and cannot support the wide array of global information available over the Internet which the user may be interested in accessing. The second draw back to such a solution is that this solution still requires a user to gain access to a computer terminal and modem in order to check his or her e-mail account.
What is needed is a device which allows digital Internet information to be retrieved, converted to a voice mail message, and stored in a user""s voice mailbox for remote retrieval. This way, the user can access the information from anywhere in the world by simply dialing into his or her voice mail system and retrieving the information from his or her voice mailbox. What is further needed is a device which allows such voice mail messages to be automatically distributed to multiple users on a wide scale distribution basis without requiring a user to manually perform the message transfer operation.
A method and apparatus for automatically accessing information such as an e-mail message from the Internet and downloading the information to a voice mailbox for retrieval over a voice mail messaging system. The method and apparatus accesses the Internet and downloads the information to be retrieved. The method and apparatus then performs a text-to-speech conversion, if necessary, on the information, to form a digital audio file, which can be stored in a voice mail box and later retrieved by the user. Preferably, the system first forms a digital audio file. If necessary, the digital audio file is then further converted to a proprietary digital format and transmitted to a dedicated telephonic voice messaging system. Typically, but not necessarily, the type of digital audio file is proprietary to the manufacturer of the voice mail system. The dedicated telephonic voice messaging system may be a customized system or a previously in-use system which has been configured to enable the system to communicate properly with the apparatus of the present invention. The method and apparatus of the present invention then instructs the dedicated telephonic voice messaging system to transmit the information to the voice mailbox of the selected user or several users. In this way, a user can listen to the received message. The users may be users specific to the dedicated telephonic voice messaging system or users of other voice messaging systems which are networked with the dedicated telephonic voice messaging system through a conventional voice mail network which is established over the PSTN lines or digital link. This voice mail network may or may not use proprietary protocols.